And Jesus, perceiving in Himself that power had gone out from Him, immediately turned to the crowd and said, “Who touched My garments.” And His disciples said to Him, “You see the crowd pressing around You, and yet You say, “Who touched Me?” Mark 5:30-31 ESV1
Read Matthew 9:20-22, Mark 5:24b-34 & Luke 8:42b-48
As Jesus was on His way to Jairus’ home to raise his daughter, something unexpected happened. Something unexpected but not something irrelevant. Something unexpected but not something disregarded. Something unexpected but not something unimportant.
“And a great crowd followed Him and thronged about Him” (Mark 5:24b), “[and] the people pressed around Him” (Luke 8:42b). “And there was a woman who had had a discharge of blood for twelve years, and who had suffered much under many physicians, and had spent all that she had” (Mark 5: 25-26a), “all her living on physicians; she could not be healed by anyone” (Luke 8:43), “and was no better but rather grew worse. She had heard the reports about Jesus and came up behind Him in the crowd and touched [the fringe of] His garment. For she said, ‘If I touch even His garments, I will be made well.’ And immediately the flow of blood dried up, and she felt in her body that she was healed of her disease. And Jesus, perceiving in Himself that power had gone out from Him, immediately turned about in the crowd and said, ‘Who touched My garments?’” (Mark 5:26b-30). “When all denied it, Peter said, ‘Master, the crowds surround You and are pressing in on You!’” (Luke 8:45b), “and yet You say, “Who touched Me?”’ And He looked around to see who had done it” (Mark 5:31-32). “Jesus said, ‘Someone touched Me, for I perceive that power has gone out from Me.’ And when the woman saw that she was not hidden” (Luke 8:46-47), “knowing what had happened to her, came in fear and trembling and fell down before Him and told Him the whole truth. And He said to her, ‘Daughter, your faith has made you well; go in peace and be healed of your disease’” (Mark 5:33-34).
What was different about this woman’s touch than the touch of everyone else in the crowd? How did Jesus distinguish it from the casual bump or brush or push from the others? What was it about her touch that enabled power to be released from Jesus?
Her touch was out of desperation. She had been through so much. Jesus was her only hope. She had to get to Jesus. She didn’t just want to see Him. She needed to touch Him. Her life and livelihood depended on it. No one else could help her. She had nothing left. Even if her attempt to get to Jesus put her life in danger, she had to get to Him.
Her touch was out of humility. Whether her disease or life experience humbled her, or she was by personality humble, she wasn’t making a show out of this. She came to Jesus as secretly as possible coming “up behind Him in the crowd” (Mark 5:27). She didn’t send someone to get Jesus and bring Him to her. She didn’t have someone bring her to Jesus. She didn’t call for Jesus from outside the crowd to come over and heal her. She didn’t even ask Jesus for help when she got to Him. All she did was reach out and touch His robe. All she needed was Jesus. And she didn’t even want Jesus to know.
Her touch was out of loneliness. No one came with her. No one helped her. Besides the doctors who drained her of all her resources and left her with no hope, she likely had not known the touch of another for 12 long years. The Levitical Laws required she keep to herself. “When a woman has a discharge, and the discharge in her body is blood, she shall be in her menstrual impurity … And everything on which she lies during her menstrual impurity shall be unclean. Everything also on which she sits shall be unclean … If a woman has a discharge of blood for many days, not at the time of her menstrual impurity, or if she has a discharge beyond the time of her impurity, all the days of the discharge she shall continue in uncleanness” (Leviticus 15:19-20, 25). She was unclean and could make others unclean. If she had had a husband, he was assumably long gone. Her extended family, not wanting to be defiled, probably drifted away. Those who had been her friends likely saw her cursed and left her alone.
Her touch was courteous. Her condition made her unclean and excluded her from social contact. She desperately wanted Jesus to heal her, but she knew her bleeding would cause Jesus to be made unclean under Jewish law. “When a woman has a discharge, and the discharge in her body is blood … whoever touches her shall be unclean until the evening … Whoever touches her bed shall wash his clothes and bathe himself in water and be unclean until the evening. And whoever touches anything on which she sits shall wash his clothes and bathe himself in water and be unclean until the evening. Whether it is the bed or anything on which she sits, when he touches it he shall be unclean until the evening” (Leviticus 15:21-23). That is why she didn’t ask for His healing touch. Instead, she quietly reached out and touched only His robe. She knew what she needed, but she didn’t want to harm Jesus.
Her touch was courageous. Making a way through a thick crowd is hard work. As a woman, and in her condition, having had a constant flow of blood for 12 years, she was likely weak. Imagine a feeble woman trying to make it through a crowd of any kind. There would have been lots of younger, bigger, stronger people wanting to get close to the celebrity, Jesus. With no one looking out for her, she would have been pushed back, and others would have squeezed into the prime positions. It would have taken a great deal of effort, maybe all she had, for her to get to Jesus.
Her touch was out of faith. “She had heard the reports about Jesus” (Mark 5:27) and thought to herself, “’If I touch even His garments, I will be made well’” (Mark 5:28). Even after all of the disappointing ineffectiveness of everything else she tried and everyone from whom she sought help, she didn’t lose her faith in the healing power of God. In faith, she was willing to do whatever it took to get to Jesus. Jesus recognized her faith. He was impressed with her. He stated, “‘Daughter, your faith has made you well; go in peace and be healed of your disease’” (Mark 5:34).
Her touch was an interruption. Jesus was on a serious errand. The whole crowd knew it, but He stopped because someone had touched Him in a special way. His disciples tried to dismiss it and urged Him to hurry along. But Jesus insisted. It wasn’t because Jesus didn’t know who touched Him. It wasn’t because He was angry with the one who touched Him. He wanted the woman to step forward to identify and explain herself. This was not only for the benefit of the woman but the entire thronging crowd. This may have even been a God-ordained interruption.
To all who had the eyes to see it and the hearts to respond to it, this interruption was a picture of why Jesus had come. While all the other law-abiding Jewish men, to protect themselves from the possibility of becoming ceremonially unclean because of a menstruating woman, would have carefully avoided touching, speaking to, or even looking at women, Jesus proclaimed to hundreds of people that this unclean woman had touched Him. And He didn’t chastise her. Instead, He instantly changed a situation that had been a problem for years. He tenderly addressed her and praised her faith.
Jesus didn’t protect Himself from defilement by this bleeding woman, and He doesn’t protect Himself from anyone else who comes to Him in desperation, humility, and faith, courageously believing He is the only One Who can help. We are all untouchable and unclean compared to the holiness of God. Jesus became unclean for us when He took our sin and sickness on the cross. “For our sake [God] made [Jesus] to be sin Who knew no sin, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Corinthians 5:21).
We too can come trembling and with fear, falling at His feet, and telling Him the whole truth (see Mark 5:33). When we reach out to touch Jesus like this, He takes upon Himself our sin and sickness. Instantaneously, we are freed from our sin sickness. Then He reaches out and touches us giving us His power to live in peace and freedom as children of God. He, in effect, tenderly says to us, “’Daughter [or Son], your faith has healed you’” (Mark 5:33). Then there is great rejoicing in Heaven (see Luke 15:10).
Yes, there is a difference between the crowds that are curious about Jesus and the few who reach out and touch Him. Have you reached out and touched Jesus in this way?
1 Scripture quotations marked with ESV are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version (ESV), copyright 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. All Scriptures are taken from the ESV unless otherwise noted. To aid in understanding, I have capitalized references to God.